Home/News/BREAKING NEWS: Trump in public Oval Office shouting match with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer as he threatens to shut down the government to get his wall built - and they call him a 'Pinocchio' and tell him: 'Elections have consequences' (7 Pics)

BREAKING NEWS: Trump in public Oval Office shouting match with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer as he threatens to shut down the government to get his wall built - and they call him a 'Pinocchio' and tell him: 'Elections have consequences' (7 Pics)

Donald Trump's negotiating session with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer spiraled wildly out of control on Tuesday, with the politicians viciously tearing into the president in plain view of reporters.

Pelosi informed him that his border wall wouldn't pass in the House of Representatives, where Republicans hold a majority of seats, if it came for a vote.

'The fact is you do not have the votes in the House,' she told him pointedly.

Trump angrily told the expected speaker of the House that funding for his wall would pass in 'two seconds' in the lower chamber, only it doesn't matter because it won't reach the 60-vote threshold in the Senate without Democratic support.

Schumer brought up his 'Pinocchio' score in the Washington Post.

'Elections have consequences,' Schumer hollered at Trump as the wild fight played out on camera.

Trump had earlier portrayed illegal immigrants as disease-carrying lawbreakers who must be blocked from entering the country by his proposed border wall on Tuesday morning.

Heading into a meeting today with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, Trump turned up the heat on Democrats, saying he would have the military build his border wall if Democrats refuse to appropriate the funding as part of a must-pass spending bill.

'People do not yet realize how much of the Wall, including really effective renovation, has already been built. If the Democrats do not give us the votes to secure our Country, the Military will build the remaining sections of the Wall. They know how important it is!' Trump tweeted.

Trump claimed that Democrats are withholding the money 'strictly political reasons' and that they want to open America's borders to Mexican and Central American migrants.

'This brings large scale crime and disease,' the Republican president claimed.

Trump had restrained himself from drawing a red line on border security spending in advance of the meeting at the White House with top-ranking Democrats after indicating in the fall that that he intended to go to the mat over it.

He had Washington on the edge of its seat this week as in a will-he or won't-he government shut down debate. Trump had previously suggested that he would not sign a bill to keep certain areas of the government humming if lawmakers denied him a $5 billion ask to complete his border wall.

Such a move could backfire on Republicans, though, as the federal government devolved into chaos days before the Christmas holiday.

Trump unveiled a new strategy on Tuesday that is certain to be almost as controversial: circumvent Congress altogether and put the military to work building it.

A group of Democratic senators had informed the Trump administration just yesterday that the military cannot redirect funds to border wall projects.

They told the president's Pentagon chief in a letter that a plan to build 31 miles of border barriers on a bombing range in Arizona was unauthorized and therefore illegal.

Trump hinted on Tuesday that he has plans for the military to do more than just put up walling along property under the control of the Pentagon -- he wants to use the money he insisted the troops needed for weapons of war to have service members building a far-reaching border wall.

Democrats were already skeptical that an olive branch from the president - the Tuesday tete-a-tete with Schumer and Pelosi -- would result an arrangement that both parties view as acceptable.

Even if it does, they worried the president will renege on anything he might agree to.

'We’ve had limited success in dealing with this president,' Sen. Dick Durbin told Politico. 'His word isn’t good. Within 48 hours he reverses himself. It’s very difficult to enter into a long-term agreement.'

The president's tweets on the morning of the meeting suggested that Trump would be open to signing a long-term spending deal, even if it doesn't include money for his wall, because he's going to order his administration to construct it, regardless of of whether he wins a green light from Congress.

'Despite the large Caravans that WERE forming and heading to our Country, people have not been able to get through our newly built Walls, makeshift Walls & Fences, or Border Patrol Officers & Military. They are now staying in Mexico or going back to their original countries,' the president said in his first message.

He went on to say that Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers are doing a superb jog but a 'Great Wall would be, however, a far easier & less expensive solution' to border security problems.

'We have already built large new sections & fully renovated others, making them like new,' he claimed. 'The Democrats, however, for strictly political reasons and because they have been pulled so far left, do NOT want Border Security.

'They want Open Borders for anyone to come in. This brings large scale crime and disease. Our Southern Border is now Secure and will remain that way.'

Tying the comments directly to his discussion this morning with Democrats, the president contended that Pelosi, who is facing a challenge from within her caucus for the gavel, is opposing his wall to keep the left-wing of her party at bay.

'I look forward to my meeting with Chuck Schumer & Nancy Pelosi. In 2006, Democrats voted for a Wall, and they were right to do so. Today, they no longer want Border Security,' he tweeted. 'They will fight it at all cost, and Nancy must get votes for Speaker. But the Wall will get built.'

And then, in his big finale to the string of tweets about border security, Trump revealed his negotiating strategy.

'If the Democrats do not give us the votes to secure our Country, the Military will build the remaining sections of the Wall,' he asserted.

Democratic senators warned the president's Pentagon chief on Monday that a plan to use defense funds build border barriers in Arizona would be controversial if carried out and unauthorized.

Sens. Jack Reed, the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, Patrick Leahy, the vice chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Dick Durbin and Brian Schatz told Defense Secretary James Mattis in a letter that the Navy did not provide a compelling argument for studies on 31 miles of barriers along a bombing range near Yuma.

The project would divert as much as $450 million in funds that were intended for military readiness activities, they insisted.

'We believe the Department of Defense lacks any authorization or appropriations needed to move this project into any stage of construction during fiscal year 2019,' the senators said.

The White House had not taken an official stance on a long-term bill after approving a short-term agreement on Friday that delayed a decision to Dec. 21. A partial government shutdown will go into effect at midnight the next morning if the two sides cannot come to agreement.

In their letter, the senators told Mattis that he should not attempt to circumvent the legislative body by making use of a code that authorizes the military to provide a support role in counternarcotics operations along the border.

'We urge you in the strongest possible fashion to refrain from considering using this authority or 10 U.S.C. 284 for this potential $450 million border wall project,' they wrote.

Mattis has been considering the project at the Barry M. Goldwater Range at the request of Department of Homeland Security.

President Trump has identified Arizona as an area where border barriers are needed the most.

He said claimed on Twitter last Thursday that Arizona 'is bracing for a massive surge' of immigrants along a portion of the US southern border that does not have a protective fence.

'Arizona, together with our Military and Border Patrol, is bracing for a massive surge at a NON-WALLED area. WE WILL NOT LET THEM THROUGH,' Trump wrote in a post that maintained pressure on lawmakers seeking to approve legislation to keep the government open through to September 30 next year.

It remains unclear exactly what the president is offering Democrats in return for their support on his desired border wall spending. Pelosi has said she won't trade the money for a permanent legislative fix to a program that addressed the plight of illegal immigrant children.

Democrats have signaled that they are willing to give Trump a third of the money he has laid out as a necessary for his wall but have stipulated that it can only be used for fencing.

Trump said early in the year that he wouldn't accept an immigration deal that doesn't include a total overhaul of the system, even if he does get his wall funding. Immigration subsequently became a wedge issue in the election, with Democrats ultimately winning their battle to control a majority of seats in the House and Republicans maintaining their advantage in the Senate.

They now appear to be at an impasse with the president who has also said he is 'totally willing' to force a government shutdown until they approve his proposed border wall spending.

Legislators in the House and the Senate passed a short-term bill to keep the engines running beyond this past Friday, when federal funding for some agencies was scheduled to run out. Trump agreed to the delay out of respect for the family of the late President Bush, whose funeral was held last Wednesday in Washington at the National Cathedral.

Trump has signaled that he'll go to great lengths to get the funding he desires for his border wall, having repeatedly threatened to close the nation's southern border.

Schumer and Pelosi are refusing to wrangle votes for any agreement that provides funding for Trump's border wall, however. The best that Trump can hope for, Schumer says, is $1.6 billion in spending that he could put toward fencing and could not be used for any other type of border barrier.

He says Trump could otherwise accept a continuing resolution that appropriates $1.3 billion toward border security spending for the current fiscal year. If he doesn't want a shutdown, those are his only options.

Trump claimed Friday that the wall would pay for itself in a single month.

'We're talking about a wall for 20 billion, 15 billion. I could even do it cheaper if I have to, and it'll be better than anybody's ever seen a wall,' Trump claimed in a Kansas City speech to law enforcement. 'Think of that. You're talking about hundreds of billions of dollars, and you're talking about a fraction. You'd make it up in a month – a month! – by having a proper wall.'

The president declared illegal immigration 'a threat' to every American community that is 'overwhelming public resources and draining the federal treasury.

'Congress must fully fund border security in the year-ending funding bill. We have to get this done. They're playing games. They're playing political games,' he proclaimed. 'I actually think the politics of what they're doing is very bad for them, but we're going to very soon find out.'

Trump boasted to his audience: 'Maybe I'm not right. But usually I'm right. Like, I said, "I'm going to win for president." And some people said that won't happen, and guess what? Look who's up here now, folks?'

Trump told Democrats they could fund his wall or grapple with a shut down of the border last Monday morning as he picked a immigration fight.

He took another swat at the opposing party on Tuesday in a tweet that claimed $25 billion in border security spending could be erased if they would only spend $5 billion on completing his border structure.

The president has also said he's more than willing to let funding for his cabinet agencies expire, calling it a political winner for the GOP.

'We need border security in this country, and if that means a shutdown I would totally be willing to shut it down,' he said last month. 'And I think it's a really bad issue for the Democrats.'

GOP leaders will not attend the negotiating session with Trump at the White House on Tuesday, leaving the president to do his own bidding.

A House Republican source told DailyMail.com that the caucus would support the measure that is already a part of the lower chamber's Homeland Security appropriations bill.

'How members in the Senate vote is entirely up to them,' the person said.

But Republicans also fear being blamed for a future shutdown, and they are feeling pressure to finalize a budget agreement before Christmas.

The next Congress will likely convene at noon on January 3, at which point Democrats will have more negotiating power.

Pelosi has already slapped down a proposal to bring more of her members into the fold by trading the border wall for illegal immigrants who were brought to the United States as children.

'They're two different subjects,' she said. 'I think what we can do, that makes sense, is to pass six bills where the members of the Appropriations Committee have come to terms. You heard me say it over and over, left to their own devices, the appropriators can come to a good conclusion, and then have a [continuing resolution] only for Homeland Security as we go forward. And that's pretty much what our position is now.'

Trump last year formally invalidated the Obama-era program that spared that large group of non-citizens from deportation, but court rulings have tied his hands and the temporary amnesty has continued.

In the Senate, the president needs nine Democrats to cross party lines, assuming every Republican lends their support to his border wall demand, in order to overcome a filibuster.

His antics have not spooked Schumer, who last week said that Trump was free to throw a 'temper tantrum' and force a shut down if he wants, although he would advise against it.

Many federal agencies will run out of money on Dec. 21 unless Congress and the White House agree on a path forward.

BREAKING NEWS: Trump in public Oval Office shouting match with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer as he threatens to shut down the government to get his wall built - and they call him a 'Pinocchio' and tell him: 'Elections have consequences' (7 Pics)
Reviewed by CUZZ BLUE
on
December 11, 2018
Rating: 5